Work is progressing on options to mitigate beach erosion at Flaxmill Bay as part of a wider programme of work to protect our Coromandel coastline.

A combination of king tides and an extreme weather event last July last caused significant erosion at Flaxmill Bay and Cooks Beach, and our Council has been discussing appropriate options to address this through a series of community meetings and workshops.

We have a current resource consent application with Waikato Regional Council for a staged rock revetment at Cooks Beach that will transition to a backstop wall and, ultimately, to a soft option (dune plantings) to protect this beach. We are currently finalising the preliminary design drawings for the application, with updates to the beach access and landscaping enhancements.

Once we have these design drawings together we will come back to the community for an update on the project, process and cost to complete this within this financial year (June 2019).

At the same time, we are working on a second resource consent application to build a trial groyne at Flaxmill Bay. The exact location and material for this groyne, which is a low wall extending out from the beach into the sea, is still to be finalised.

All going to plan, construction of the erosion protection works will start before the middle of this year, and construction of the groyne is expected to start before July.

Our Council’s coastal engineer Jan van der Vliet says environmental changes have raised the community’s awareness of the need for careful management of the coastline, and in particular our foreshore.

“We are pleased to be making progress on these two projects to address coastal erosion in Flaxmill Bay and Cooks Beach and we will continue to keep the community updated as we work through the process," Jan says.

Working together to protect our coast

Last year our Council adopted the Coastal Management Strategy, which sets out a range of initiatives we will be taking over the coming years to better manage our coastal assets and understand the risk of coastal inundation and coastal erosion.

The 2018-2028 Long Term Plan includes $2.6 million over three years to help us implement this through the development of Shoreline Management Plans.

This approach to coastal management activity ensures a district-wide approach, allowing us to better-manage our coastline from a holistic and long-term perspective. We work together with public and private organisations such as the Waikato Regional Council, New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA), the Department of Conservation, iwi and community groups with an interest in coastal protection.

‘Coastal management’ encompasses a wide range of challenges and opportunities to identify hazards, risks and action plans by and through the community as a whole. The development of Shoreline Management Plans will provide a process and ultimately realistic and affordable action plans to mitigate these, with a view to building 'resilient’ coastal communities.

The CMS was adopted by Council in June 2018. You can read more about the strategy here.

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